


Snow Angels

by Inkribbon796



Series: Masks and Maladies [108]
Category: Markiplier fandom - Fandom
Genre: Fluff, M/M, pure fluff, slight hint of angst, superhero au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-11
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:34:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28009296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Inkribbon796/pseuds/Inkribbon796
Summary: Illinois has a special surprise for Eric.
Relationships: Eric Derekson/Illinois
Series: Masks and Maladies [108]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1538131
Comments: 54
Kudos: 15





	Snow Angels

Directly after talking to the Host, Illinois ran from the library and into his bedroom where he promptly took a shower, trimmed his facial hair, and brushed his teeth.

For the finishing touches to his preparation he added a dab or two of cologne under his ears and quickly grabbed something he’d been hiding in his sock drawer for two years now.

He hadn’t intended to give this to Eric, didn’t think he’d ever give it to anyone after his third travel partner died. But Eric was everything . . . and he was incredibly resilient to Illinois’s luck.

Illinois ran down the hall, running into Dark. After a quick chat, Dark opened a portal for him about a block from the heroes’ base.

The instant the portal closed, Illinois pulled out his phone and made a quick call, “Hey Kay, it’s me, I need a favor. A big one.”

Eric was almost falling asleep on one of the lobby couches, resting his legs with his prosthetics on the ground next to him.

He was gently woken up to the sound of someone talking. Unlike most of the time when being awoken in his sleep would cause disorientation and anxiety, Eric had time to gradually wake himself up.

“Nah, I got it, don’t worry,” King said in the kitchen, pushing his glasses back onto his face. It took Eric some time to realize he was on the phone with someone. “Don’t worry lover boy, I won’t spoil the surprise.”

Eric groaned and picked himself up, reaching blindly for his glasses.

“Oh, hey Eric did I wake you?” King asked gently. “Sorry buddy.”

“Mmm’ fine,” Eric grumbled.

“Hey, you wanna head out with me, just for a bit, it’s not a patrol or anything I just don’t spend enough time with anyone,” King asked.

Eric shrugged and got up, wrapping himself up in a jacket and some gloves, he made sure he was wearing modified leg warmers so his prosthetics wouldn’t cause his legs to feel like they’d frozen over.

They made it two blocks, Kay joking around as he tried to get Randall to answer his texts. Then Illinois jumped out from behind a parked car and threw a whole mess of snow at Kay. The younger brother screamed in surprise and pushed Illinois away from, throwing snow back at him as Eric watched, mostly untouched by the impromptu snow fight.

After Illinois shoving some snow down Kay’s coat and almost getting his nose broken in retaliation, the three of them started walking. Eric and Illinois were walking hand in hand. Randall was going to join them for _“security”_ but after a bit King stopped.

“Alright, something’s up,” King finally commented, looking at his phone. “I’m going to go and find him, Ills can you try not to eat Eric’s whole face while I’m not here?”

“No promises,” Illinois grinned, pulling Eric by his waist a little closer to him. “I can’t resist this face.”

Eric’s face flushed with more than just the cold.

King stared at him, and Illinois rolled his eyes.

“Fine we’ll meet you by the park,” Illinois took Eric’s hand and started to lead him away from King, the other hero on his phone.

They walked a bit until they made it to King’s park and to Eric’s surprise, Illinois took a couple of steps inside of it.

“King w-won’t mind?” Eric asked, looking around.

“I talked with him, so long as I don’t bring other people from work in, he’ll be fine,” Illinois dismissed.

They walked around the almost empty park. Illinois flopping into the snow and eventually coaxed Eric into making snow angels with him.

After a while they went and sat on a snow covered bench. Illinois tried to dust off most of the snow and ice. The bench was facing a river towards the back of the park, a sheet of ice coating the surface.

Eric was looking out over the park, a calm little half smile on his face. And Illinois thought that was the most beautiful sight in the world. “It’s so pretty with all the snow.”

“Yeah,” Illinois just stared at Eric. “The park is too.”

Eric looked over to notice Illinois was staring at him. He got all flustered and shy.

“I can see why King took the place over,” Illinois commented smoothly. “Lots of good memories here.”

“Like what?” Eric asked, leaning against Illinois.

Illinois smiled, leaning into him a bit and wrapping an arm around him. “Artie once pushed Kay into the river. Dark just about lost his mind, fishing him out of the river.”

Eric looked started, “Was he . . . _uhmm_ . . . alright?”

“Oh yeah, he knew how to swim and it was late summer so it was like ankle deep,” Illinois dismissed. “You doing okay? Your prosthetics bugging you?”

Eric shook his head.

Illinois stood up, “if you’re sure, there’s this nice cafe we could go and warm up there. Or we can go out onto the river.”

Eric looked at the river nervously, looking down at his legs. “It . . . It’ll break?”

“What, the ice?” Illinois asked. When Eric nodded, Illinois smiled at him. “Don’t worry, I won’t let anything happen to you, and you don’t have to go any farther than the bank if you don’t feel safe.”

“O— Okay,” Eric allowed and let Illinois pull him out and the instant Eric set foot on the ice the nanites in his prosthetics shifted and the ends of them became ice skates, a wide base above the blades to help with Eric’s balance.

All Illinois did was put something on the base of his shoes and icicle blades magically grew from the soles of his shoes, magically strong enough for him to skate with.

Illinois was already out of the ice, testing it and proving the ice was sturdy but Eric’s few attempts resulted in Eric slipping on the ice a lot.

Eric tried to keep his balance while Illinois was already doing small little spins on the ice. All Eric could do was smile and watch him. His arms held out in an attempt to balance himself.

After pulling out of another spin, Illinois slid over. He dropped to a knee at the final part of his slide. He was smiling up at Eric. “You like my little tricks?”

“I can’t,” Eric paused a looked away in frustration for a bit as he tried to say what he wanted, “ca-n’t sk-ate like you.”

“That’s okay, I’m better at magic tricks anyway,” Illinois smiled, an expression of absolute adoration on his face. “Wanna see a new one, I just learned it?”

Eric gave a small smile, nodding as he looked back at Illinois.

“Okay,” Illinois felt his heartbeat quicken with excitement as he prepared to do a sleight of hand trick. “Watch closely, I’m going to make something appear out of thin air.”

He grabbed Eric’s hand with one hand, distracting him as a black jewelry box seemingly appeared in his other hand. Eric stiffened in surprise and Illinois with one hand flipped it open to reveal a silver band with green and white stones set into it.

“Eric Derekson, these last few months have been the most wonderful I’ve ever been and felt in my life. Will you marry me?”

Eric just stared at him, eyes blown open in shock before he just started crying.

“Uhh,” Illinois just stayed kneeling on the ice, unsure what to do. If that was a no or yes.

But then Eric managed a tearful but smiling, “Yes.”

“Yeah?” Illinois smiled.

Eric was still crying as he nodded, Illinois sliding the ring on.

Illinois made this happy whooping cheer and scooped Eric up and stepped back onto the snow, his enchantment for his shoes running out just in time for Illinois to capture Eric’s lips with his own.

“You won’t regret this,” Illinois promised Eric, resting his forehead against Eric’s. “I swear, I’ll spend every day of my life making sure you don’t regret it.”

Eric hugged himself to Illinois, he hadn’t been expecting the proposal. He hadn’t even imagined even being in a relationship where that would be an option for him. But Illinois treated Eric like he was someone worth loving, and not just in a _“we’re actually friends and I care about you”_ type of way. Illinois was different. The hope of something more . . . something that amazed and terrified him with how it made him feel.

“Let’s go break the news,” Illinois said in excitement. “We’ll start with my family then we can tell yours.”

“Wa-Wait,” Eric said in nervousness, pressing on Illinois’s shoulders.

“Let’s go,” Illinois smiled.

There was a clearing of a throat and Eric looked to see King standing about ten feet away with his phone, pointed at them. “Smile for the camera.”

“He said yes,” Illinois was all smiles.

“Yeah, yeah, do the future grooms have anything to say to the camera?” King asked.

“Did you get the whole thing?” Illinois asked.

“I started when you two got out onto the ice,” King smiled.

“Uhh, _umm,_ Ran—” Eric started before King smiled.

“Nah, he’s at the base waiting for us,” King grinned. “He just got off patrol. You two should head off to break the news to Dark. Don’t worry kid, he’s an asshole but he won’t hurt you.”

“Oh, uh okay,” Eric said nervously. Illinois finally put him down.

The adventurer pulled his hat off his head and tapped at the bronze star. A portal promptly opened up for them. Illinois offered out his arm for Eric. “Shall we, or do you want to talk to the heroes first?”

Eric was nervous. Dark was — in his mind — a foreboding force of nature. And he knew from how Illinois spoke of him and he meant a lot to him.

Reluctantly, Eric took his arm and clung to it. He hid behind Illinois as they looked at the portal.

“I won’t let him hurt you,” Illinois promised.

Clinging onto Illinois he nodded and they walked through the portal.

Dark was sitting on his desk, flipping through a magical tome with a look of frustrated concentration on his face, a stack of old looking books in front of him. “Illinois, do you remember which of these blasted books you got from Bagdad? The alchemy one with the concealer charm?”

“It’s the one with the eclipse diagram in it, because I know you can’t read Arabic,” Illinois commented.

“Right, right,” Dark tugged a book out of the stack and stood up. “It was the one with the Turkish Constantinopolitan dancers that Wil said—”

At that moment Dark realized that someone other than him and Illinois were in his home office, Eric ducked behind Illinois in fear and Dark just stood there.

Thankfully Illinois spoke up first before Dark could get over his shock of having a complete stranger in his personal home office.

“아빠,” Illinois said in pure excitement. “아빠 I have the best news. I want you to meet Eric.”

Dark seemed to recover quickly and tried to look around Illinois. “Eric?”

Eric glanced up and just about screamed in fear when his eyes met Dark’s.

“Oh, Derekson,” Dark recognized.

“You’ve met?” Illinois smiled.

“Twice, very briefly,” Dark answered firmly, “everytime else he was in that ridiculous outfit.”

“Oh yeah, he’s adorable in that,” Illinois commented.

Dark rolled his eyes, “Right, you had to inherit something from Wil.”

Eric braced to get hit or thrown out of Dark’s office so that they could _“talk”_ about who Illinois chose to spend his time with.

The ringing from Dark’s aura was gone and when Eric bravely glanced up Dark’s wasn’t there . . . Damien was there instead.

“Hello,” _“Damien”_ gave a small smile, Eric was a lot more willing to look at Dark. “Eric, right?”

“See, he’s not going to hurt you,” Illinois told him. “Show him, _dulcito,_ we have great news 아빠.”

Eric still hid his face in Illinois’s shoulder but let himself be moved out enough for Dark to see his hand.

Dark caught the ring instantly, and his form flickered between, his red and blue forms.

“He said yes, we’re gonna get married,” Illinois smiled. “Isn’t this amazing?”

“I,” Dark felt a weight form in his throat. “I wasn’t aware your relationship was this advanced.”

“We met when I was in Brazil,” Illinois explained and he started going off about how brave and kind and wonderful he was and how the trip went. He very noticeably omitted Roman and Marvin’s presence and involvement in the strip entirely.

“How,” Dark began, but in his head his red soul thought: _“you’re going too fast!”_ but he only said, “wonderful.”

His ring finger burned with the long-thought dead memory of his red soul’s own wedding ring. _“You just met him, you barely know him!”_

“You’re just,” Thoughts of a wedding that led to a marriage that ended in complete and utter disaster burned in Dark’s mind. A look of complete calm came over Dark as he took his blue soul’s form again. “I do wish you’d told me sooner, weddings don’t just happen in a day.”

“We can take as much time as we need,” Illinois dismissed.

“I can draft up the better housing areas in the city,” Dark quickly offered. “Or would you heather take the lake house?”

“We can talk about renovating the lake house some other time,” Illinois told Dark, feeling Eric grip his hand tighter a little. “Not getting married next week.”

“Of course,” Dark nodded.

“I gotta take Eric back home,” Illinois told him. “We’ll talk about the lake house when I get back.”

Dark nodded, opening up a void portal that was right in front of the hero’s base. As soon as it was closed and Dark was alone he let out a scream that he felt really encapsulated his raging storm of emotions. Only one he was calm and his screaming was done did he grab the time he’d been looking for and began heading towards Bim’s bedroom. He had to be quick before Bim’s aura got any stronger and started fighting him.

At the base the heroes were very hesitant with Illinois. He wasn’t allowed inside, obviously but King had gathered all the heroes currently in the base for _“a surprise”_ and once the ring came out the reactions were mixed, but mostly positive.

Roman looked at the ring and then he screamed at the top of his lungs in joy, jumping up and down, shaking Virgil harshly in his excitement. “He’s getting married! _Ahhhhhhh!_ I’m gonna die!”

“Princey, Princey,” Virgil tried to pull him off but Roman jumped away and rushed towards Eric, Illinois protectively and instinctively stepping in front of Eric to protect him.

“Please let me plan it, I promise it will be amazingly perfect, it’s my dream, please, please, please” Roman rambled.

“You can talk to the Old Man about that,” Illinois told him. “We’ve got time to plan this whole thing. Make it as fancy or simple as we want.”

Roman looked especially put out about that but his bruised ego was soothed and Illinois reluctantly left, kissing Eric on the lips before gently touching his lips to the knuckle that bore Eric’s new ring and waved his fingers as a ring appeared on his own hand, promising, “I’ll return for you soon, my sweet. Dream of me.”

Eric blushed and watched Illinois leave through a portal.

Everything was calm for a couple seconds as Eric stared at the space his new fiancé had just been in.

Then Ethan spoke up, questioning, “Didn’t you meet him like a year ago or something?”

“Hush, it’s true love,” Roman told him, waving in his direction.

“Congratulations my boy,” Wilford clapped his hand to Illinois’s shoulder, hugging him to his chest.

“Thanks,” Illinois smiled.

“Bring the nice lad around, we’ll give him a tour of the old place,” Wil offered.

Bim stomped into the foyer where Wil and Illinois were, looking pissed. Dark was coming from the kitchen with a glass of what looked like wine in his hand. “Could you fuckers be any louder?”

“Here,” Dark offered Bim, his aura coming back from a portal he’d opened up just before entering the room. “This should help.”

“Thanks,” Bim snapped and downed it in one go. There was an odd aftertaste to it but he was too tired to register it as something he should be suspicious of.

“Good news Bimmy Boy,” Wilford smiled. “Old Illy here’s getting hitched.”

“What?” Bim demanded angrily.

“I’m getting married, you remember that hero I keep telling you not to eat?” Illinois clarified. “Him.”

“ _You’re_ getting married?” Bim looked conflicted. “You two living here or moving out.”

“Move out,” Illinois shrugged. “Stretch my wings out a bit. I won’t go far, Dark’s been talking about renovating the lake house for me. ‘Bout time we did something with the place really.”

“Wait you,” Bim started before collapsing on the ground in a sleep-induced unconsciousness.

“Oh good it works,” Dark commented.

“What was that?” Illinois asked, pointed at Bim as Dark picked him up with his aura.

“A potion for when Wil gets out of control,” Dark lied, his aura stroking Bim hair lovingly and gently removing his glasses. “It dilutes wonderfully in alcohol. Get some rest, Illinois, we have a lot to discuss tomorrow.”

“Can I have some of that, it looks fun?” Wilford smiled.

“Of course, give me a bit to put Bim to bed,” Dark smiled at him.

Illinois watched Dark disappear into a portal but did eventually go to bed, texting Eric as he did so.


End file.
